The Dobbs Law Firm Unthinkable Super Bowl Commercial of 2024
Passion for Movies and Brand Building:
At Hamil Bros Studios we express a deep love for movies, seamlessly integrating this passion into our video productions. While advocating for the safety of traditional approaches like interviews and testimonials, we emphasize the impact of such content in solidifying the foundation of a brand. Spencer Dobbs understands the potency of referrals and testimony, and Hamil Bros Studios continues to enjoy capturing these testimonials, check out the most recent ones from 2023.
The Unthinkable Super Bowl Commercial:
In 2023, the Dobbs Law Firm received an unexpected offer for Super Bowl airtime, a golden opportunity that arrived too close to the event for the realization of their original ideas. Determined to capitalize on the Super Bowl’s vast viewership in 2024, Hamil Bros Studios spent the last three months producing Spencer’s Unthinkable Super Bowl commercial.
Given that Super Bowl television commercials are expected to be the best a business has to offer, Spencer gave Hamil Bros Studios the opportunity to knock this video production out of the park.
The idea was to put a family in the situation no one wants to find themselves in. They would appear to be travelling, husband and wife listening to some easy-listening music while the kids are passed out in the back seat. Nothing out of the ordinary, until an 18-wheeler truck runs a stop sign, t-boning the entire family; an occurrence far too familiar to many Midland and Odessa families.
The whole thing would be wrapped up with a sincere call to action from Spencer, likely shot in his office, and closing out with the standard graphics.
Bringing a new level of Production to West Texas
Driving with Speed Bumps in Lubbock, Texas
Several months ago we began shooting tests to see the best way to pull off this video production. As testing usually goes, we were met with what some would view as failures. We didn’t see it as failures as much as learning how NOT to do it. Haha!
Originally, our intent was to shoot the ad via pursuit vehicle. A pursuit vehicle is the vehicle that captures the footage we know so well from car chases and such in big budget hollywood movies. Our budget didn’t allow us to hire out the pursuit team we wanted, so we had to try and make it happen ourselves. We had eight or nine attempts at this and our results weren’t up to par with what we wanted to deliver. Ross worked extremely hard to make it work on the post production side, but again, it didn’t rise to our expectations.
Since this was not a viable option for this video production, we tried various methods.
The first attempt was to do most of the television commercial on a green screen with visual effects. The screen test went really well, but we ran into issues with certain elements on the outside of minivan. Additionally, shooting from the back of the car didn’t give us, as viewers, any attachment to the family, so that was a bust.
Our second attempt was to rig our Matthews Studio Equipment Master Car Mount to the front of Jacob’s Ford Expedition, facing forward, and to pursue the vehicle that way. This was okay, but the footage had too much vibration for what we needed and it was going to be distracting.
Finally, our last major idea was to simply have Ross sit in the passenger seat of the follow car while Jacob drove and get the pursuit footage that way.
Now, the idea that Lubbock, Texas is the flattest place on Earth is very true, until you need it to be flat, then you realize exactly how not flat it is. Keeping the minivan square in the frame proved to be more trouble than it was worth.
So, we went back to the drawing board.
Shifting Our Focus
Needing to take a break from trying to figure out our driving footage, we decided to move into something we knew we could pull off. We needed a small win and this one would be relatively simple.
Our next move was going to be shooting the car interior of the impact shot.
For this, we had our actress, Lindsey, sitting in the drivers seat pretending to drive. The shot would be so quick that it wouldn’t take much to be convincing.
Fortunately for us, it was cloudy that day. Unfortunately, it was also rainy. Fortunately, our Aputure 600C Pro is weather proof and we were allowed to shoot under the entry driveway at Raintree Christian Church, which has a glass top so we weren’t loosing any light.
We took our popup blue screen and mounted it to a c-stand and the rest was history.
The camera on this shot was our Blackmagic Pocket 6k camera rigged with our Tokina Cinema 25-75mm zoom lens with the URSA Mini viewfinder and powered by Blueshape.
To say that Lindsey did a wonderful job would be a complete understatement.
Now, while we can neither confirm nor deny whether she gave herself whiplash, we do know that she had no need to call a personal injury attorny for the matter.
Getting Back in the Game
After getting the impact shot in the can, it was time to get the footage that would establish the family.
The green screen failed. The pursuit shots failed. What were we going to do? We decided to go back to the basics. Maybe we had over complicated things.
We decided to re-deploy the Matthews Master Car Mount. Yes. It was part of the failed attempts earlier, but, this time, we went a direction we knew would work.
We mounted it to the inside windshield and used it to get the wide shot of our family from the dash.
Getting the car mount assembled, we attached our Blackmagic Pocket 4k with the Tokina Cinema 11-20mm adapted with the EF to Micro 4/3rds Metabones Speed Booster.
This was was absolutely perfect. It gave us a stabile view of this unsuspecting family.
The only issue with this was that we had to rig a long HDMI cable to the back of the minivan where we hunkered down, trying to be invisible to the camera.
It’s hard to say how many takes were blown because we hit a bump and our heads popped into the shot, like a couple of weirdos.
For the rest of the interior footage, Ross rigged the Blackmagic 6k Cinema Camera for handheld, employing a Blackmagic shoulder pad with extended handle. The lens used here was the Tokina Cinema 25-75mm, with a Tilta follow focus unit attached. To complete the camera package, we loaded a SmallRig clip on Mattebox with the eyebrow.
Ross rode in the passenger seat, getting footage of our twins sleeping on the road after a long trip and getting some extra footage of “mom” driving.
The final challenge on this set up was that the car interior was very dark compared to the car exterior.
Luckily, we had a couple of Amaran 60d lights. We took one of them, loaded the hyper recflector cone on it, and threw on some some diffusion.
For the twins, they each took a turn holding the light on the other to get the shot. They loved getting to be involved more than just “napping”.
For mom, we had to mount the light since Ross couldn’t hold the light and operate a camera.
To work around this, we used the two smaller suction cups from the car mount kit. The light was mounted to one and the other was used to stabilize it with a micro rod.
Shooting Moving Exteriors
Keep On Rollin'
For the fimal narrative part of this television commercial, we had to get the footage that would go outside Lindsey’s window for the blue screen footage.
At first, we attempted to mount the camera to one of the interior windows on Jacob’s Expedition, but that ended up not being quite stable enough. We needed the camera to be absolutely locked off in the car. The bumps of the car would be fine, but There was some vibration that wasn’t working for us.
Our solution to this was to set up our Manfrotto tripod in the back of Ross’s Expedition with all of the seats down to create a flat surface in the back. We leveled the camera, tightened it down, and loaded the base of the tripod with about 150lbs of sand bags.
To add extra stabilization, we added the smaller car mount suction cups to a couple of windows and attached the micro rods to those and the camera. Nothing was going to move this camera until we wanted it to.
The camera, again, was the Blackmagic 6k with the Tokina 25-75mm zoom lens set at the same focal length as the blue screen shot with Lindsey.
We found a reasonable remote road in south Lubbock, and got rolling.
As we had hoped, the shots turned out exactly like we needed.
While we were out, we needed to get the impact footage.
For this, Ross handheld the camera, positioned near a stop sign, on the same road, and did a quick whip pan to simulate the minivan’s movement after being hit by a semi.
We knew that we wouldn’t have to go from a moving shot into the spin because the semi would completely obscure the exterior and we could hide the cut.
Lastly, we set up our 360-degree camera to capture an HDRI of the accident corner so that the lighting on the truck would be perfect.
A Horrible Accident
We had Lindsey’s shot, we had her background plate, we had the spinning background footage, now we just needed to marry them together.
After some searching, we found a 3D 18-wheeler model that would serve our purposes.
Ross tracked the background footage giving us the correct position of the truck as it hits the family. This wasn’t the easiest task, but it worked just the same.
We spent the time cutting the stop sign out from in front of the truck right before impact.
After numerous attempts to achieve the ideal speed for the truck, we finally succeeded in capturing the precise velocity we had envisioned. This process involved repeated adjustments and test runs, ensuring that the truck’s movement perfectly aligned with the desired visual effect.
One of the things that we had the foresight to do was find crash test footage of the actual model of minivan we were using. This gave us the perfect reference to be able to make this accident look believable.
The final and most intricate component of the visual effects puzzle involved the precise addition of the exploding window on Lindsey’s car. The realism of the entire sequence hinged on the dramatic and convincing explosion of this window. Without it, the illusion would have been entirely shattered, rendering the scene unrealistic.
The task of creating believable exploding glass presented a significant challenge. The majority of readily available exploding glass assets are designed for standard window glass, which possesses distinct shattering properties. However, what we critically required was tempered glass, the type commonly found in car windows. There is a visibly discernible difference between the way standard window glass shatters and the way tempered glass breaks, forming small, relatively harmless fragments. This crucial distinction meant that using generic assets would have been a dead giveaway, undermining the authenticity of the effect.
To overcome this hurdle, we employed a sophisticated combination of specialized exploding glass assets. These assets were specifically designed to simulate the unique fracture patterns of tempered glass. In addition to these primary assets, we incorporated finer details using Trapcode Particular, a powerful particle system. This allowed us to generate a convincing array of realistic glass fragments, scattering in a manner consistent with a true impact. The result was a highly believable and impactful explosion.
The sequence culminated in the realistic explosion of the car’s side window. To further enhance the dramatic effect and portray the broader consequences of the impact, we also artfully added a shattered windshield as well as debris from the broken bits of the dashboard that would go flying in all directions. This layered approach created a more comprehensive and visually striking representation of the collision.
To seamlessly integrate all these visual elements and ensure complete believability, a color correction process was essential. The pre-shattered window, a separate visual layer, was carefully color-corrected to precisely match the existing window tint of the actual car. Any discrepancy in tint would have immediately betrayed the illusion, revealing the artificiality of the effect. This final, subtle adjustment was crucial in sealing the realism of the entire sequence, making the impact truly convincing.
Scaring the Dobbs Law Firm Office Staff
Approvals and Talking Heads
To complete the production, we needed to get Spencer’s closing arguments… Or call to action, rather.
This visit to his office in Odessa, Texas was more exciting than normal. Typically, we are going down to have a meeting or to shoot testimonials, and, while we do enjoy those trips, this one afforded us an experience we don’t often get: we were going to get to show his office the beginning of the television commercial and see their reactions in-person.
We arrived and we loaded in, then it was time to let the fun begin.
We set up Jacob’s laptop on the front desk and everyone gathered around. This was the moment… Was it as good as we believed it was or would they be looking too hard and miss the effectiveness by trying to find problems?
We hit play and the first few seconds rolled. They watched with intensity, when all of the sudden… WHAM!!!
Kim, one of the lovely ladies in Spencer’s office screamed. Literally. When the truck hit Lindsey, she screamed, heart racing, not believing her eyes.
It was a home run.
We got Spencer’s talking-head shots done and we hit the road to put the finishing touches on the television commercial.
It didn’t take long to add the ending section and we had a completed commercial.
Are You Okay?
The Dobbs Law Firm Unthinkable Super Bowl Commercial was one of our favorites. It was a ton of trial and error, but, in the end it was exactly what it needed to be and it was better than we had hoped for.
The Super Bow came and went and with it something we never expected.
For several weeks after releasing the television commercial on social media and Matt and Lindsey sharing it on their respective social media profiles, one question kept popping up: Lindsey, are you okay? That accident looked horrific. How did we not know this happened?
That was, without a doubt, the biggest testament to how realistic the car wreck was.
I suppose you could say it… Made an impact…
Do Your Super Bowl Commercials Make and Impact?
Ready to make a commercial that leaves a lasting impact on your audience? Hamil Bros Studios specializes in cinematic video production for West Texas, bringing Hollywood-quality visuals and storytelling to local businesses.
Your Super Bowl commercial may only be airing in a local market, but that doesn’t mean it should look local. It will be shown on television right next to the multi-million dollar ads from the biggest national brands, and you need it to look just as good.
Don’t let your local ad look amateur next to national competitors. Hire Hamil Bros to produce your next Super Bowl commercial, and let’s create something unforgettable that makes you stand out from the competition.